HAVANA, Cuba, Dec 7 (ACN) Adel Yzquierdo Rodriguez, Minister of Transportation (Mitrans), highlighted the country's interest in the reordering of transport in the hands of private carriers goes well, even though the main limitation is that due to technical deficiencies of their vehicles many have not been granted the corresponding operating license.
This Friday the new legal norms recently published in the Extraordinary Official Gazette No. 77 of 2018 will come into effect, aimed at the reordering of non-state work, for which reason the head of Mitrans and other authorities of the sector offered details on the advances, difficulties and perspectives for the improvement of this service in the capital and the rest of Cuba.
Yzquierdo Rodríguez pointed out that the process began more than a year and a half ago and should conclude its first stage throughout the country by the end of 2019.
He said that the reordering will be total, to benefit above all the people, and that it is intended that private carriers exercise their activity within the established legal framework, with all the safety and technical conditions of their vehicles required to prevent accidents, and that they comply with the regulations according to the mode of service they provide.
He recalled that in Havana, since October 8, an experiment is being conducted, whose first stage will end on January 15, 2019, and includes those vehicles with capacity for four to 14 passengers, associated with 26 stations and 23 routes, with a series of economic and tax incentives on a par with regulations for those who take the initiative.
208 minibuses and 613 cars participate in this system of routers, many of them with several years of operation, and in which more than 50 thousand people move daily, at a reasonable price for the population, without forgetting, according to the Minister, that their drivers can earn in the month more than two thousand Cuban pesos in addition to making use of the repair shops of the State.
He clarified that in the capital this is not the fundamental means of transportation, since of the more than 1.4 million passengers that are counted on average daily, more than one million is assumed by the Urban Bus Company, another 100 thousand by school buses and entities of the Mitrans, and the rest by private carriers.
Therefore, now the state vehicles (leased) will coincide with those of self-employed workers who join any of these three modalities: taxis en route, free taxis and high comfort taxis (exclusive for classic cars, and primarily intended for tourism).
Both Yzquierdo Rodriguez and Marta Oramas Rivero, Vice Minister of Transport, stressed that the lack of control and order led to various irregularities, such as the circulation on the roads of cars without the proper technical state and with illegally acquired fuel, so when this December 7 enter into force the new regulations, these phenomena do not have to occur.
There were 3,415 inspections of 1,992 vehicles, and only 32 percent managed to pass them initially, but their owners have been given the opportunity to present themselves on several occasions until they fully resolve the problem, and even so a third check has been made of some of those already approved, the minister said.
Oramas Rivero pointed out that because of this situation there are 2,167 licenses withdrawn today in Havana, and this could be one of the reasons why many taxis (mostly almendrones) are not seen circulating, while recognizing that once this document is issued, the driver has 30 working days to manage or receive the bank and fuel cards, in a complex and still cumbersome process.
She informed that 1,755 transporters have already presented themselves, 460 of them have begun the process with a view to requesting the comfort service, 45 for taxis en route and 998 for free, although 263 drivers also took advantage of the activity of renters of means of transport.
She stressed that the taxi in routes has multiple advantages for drivers because the price of diesel fuel, which the State sells them, is two pesos in national currency, and can buy parts in the wholesale market, fix the vehicle in workshops of the Provincial Transport Company, in addition to having exclusivity in their routes.
The deputy called the 308 account owners who have not yet collected their corresponding operating licenses to go as soon as possible to the corresponding offices.
The Minister also pointed out that while waiting for a greater number of private carriers to join the rearrangement, the State will strengthen the service to the population with some 700 buses, not including those of the entities of the agency itself and school, as well as taxis routers.
He said that for Havana the country acquired 400 minibuses of 12 seats each, and in 2019 will receive 90 new buses, 50 of them articulated and 40 rigid, while the production plan of Diana buses and tricycles will be fulfilled, destined to other provinces
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